C H A P T E R 3

Sir William will see you now, Lieutenant Lewrie,” the major-domo informed him with the lofty, nose-high air common to all clerks to important men. Lewrie rose from his comfortable chair, shot his cuffs, settled sword and waistcoat, and followed the mincing twit into the presence of his betters.

“Sir William, Your Excellency, allow me to announce Lieutenant Lewrie, Royal Navy . . . of the Cockerel frigate, sirs. Lieutenant Lewrie,” the flunky said smoothly, with a grandiloquent gesture toward the two elegantly garbed gentlemen, chummily seated to either side of a massive marble-topped desk. “Sir William Hamilton, His Britannic Majesty, King George the Third’s ambassador-plenipotentiary to the Court of the Kingdom of Naples and the Two Sicilies. Further allow me to present you to His Excellency Sir John Acton, Bt., Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Naples and the Two Sicilies and to His Majesty, King Ferdinand the Fourth.”

“Sir William, Milord Acton . . . Your Excellencies,” Lewrie began, making a deep bow and leg to them, hat over his heart. “It is my honour to convey to you, Sir William, most immediate dispatches from Admiral Lord Hood.”

And thank God for malaria, he thought, smug over this opportunity to make the acquaintance of important people, thankful for a chance to “sport showy.” And doubting if Braxton could have pulled it off with as much innate grace. He stepped forward and laid his canvas-wrapped, tape-and riband-bound sealed packet on the vast expanse of pale gray marble. He was glad to be shot of them, frankly; they were weighted with grape-shot, and were the very Devil to carry for long.

“Ahum . . . hah,” Sir William began, drawing the bundle to him and cutting the tapes with a desk knife, after assuring himself that seals had not been tampered with. “And where is our illustrious Admiral Hood at present, Leftenant Lewrie?”

“We departed Gibraltar a week ago, Sir William. The fleet was at that instant putting to sea. Twenty-two sail of the line. Our orders were that we might rejoin off Cape Cicie or Cape Sepet . . . somewhere off Marseilles or Toulon.” He had had time to glean that much from the separate set of orders, also weighted and marked F OR C APTAIN H.M.S. C OCKEREL’S E YES O NLY . Under the circumstances, he’d had to look at them!

“You are rather junior to command a frigate, I am thinking,” Sir John Acton commented as Ambassador Hamilton read his dispatches, humming to himself, his ancient patrician face creased with flickerings of concern or satisfaction, by stages.

“I am merely first officer, Your Excellency. I regret to say that my captain, Captain Howard Braxton, was . . . uhm, detained aboard by ship’s business. Else he should have—”

“Really,” Sir John drawled, lifting one expressive brow. “Such would have been unthinkable when I was at sea. A captain, entrusted with matters of such import, and he fails to present himself, sends a junior in lieu of himself? Pardon, but I have never heard the like.”

Sir John Acton sounded English, sort of; he was fluent, but his voice had a more Mediterranean lilt to it, a subtle shading, a lack of true English syntax and usage. Perhaps from long custom among Dagoes, Lewrie thought.

“You served in the Royal Navy, did you, milord?” Lewrie asked, to finesse the subject.

“Ah, no, I never had that honour, sir,” Acton sighed wistfully. “I speak of my time as an officer in the French Navy.”

Bloody Hell, Lewrie gawped! And this . . . Frog!—well, he’s an English baronet— half -a-Frog is sittin’ in, spying, hearing all, at the side of an English ambassador? What sort o’ business they do, in Naples?

“Uhm, hah . . .” Lewrie flummoxed.

“I alarm you, sir?” Acton all but simpered. “I was born of English parentage, but in France. Naval matters . . . diplomatic duties . . . I am regretful to say, I have never been in England. I served also with the Tuscan and the Neapolitan navies as well, before rising to the office of prime minister here in Naples. Tell me, Lieutenant Lewrie, did your gallant Lord Hood also entrust you—your captain, pardon—with any messages to His Majesty, King Ferdinand the Fourth?”

“Uhm, no sir . . . Your Excellency . . . none I’m aware of, unless a letter is in that package, to be relayed to you through Sir William.”

Lewrie felt a sudden urge to fan himself with his hat and tug at his too-tight neckstock. So much for “sportin’ showy,” he sighed.

“Ah, surely, though,” Sir John sighed in concert, all but biting his thumbnail, and turning a hopeful eye on Sir William. “As events develop . . . but no? How distressing.”

“Sir John, old fellow, Admiral Lord Hood would certainly not be guilty of presuming to speak beyond his brief,” Sir William assured the younger man. Lewrie thought Acton was in his late thirties or early forties; Sir William Hamilton in a spry sort of sixties. “Events are, as you say, developing quite nicely, in point of fact. Our ambassador to His Most Catholic Majesty in Madrid, Lord St. Helens, encloses his latest success. The Spanish are in, at last.”

“Aha!” Sir John smiled, gaining enthusiasm.

“We were given signal books, so we might speak any Spanish ship we met, Sir William,” Lewrie offered.

“And did you meet any, Leftenant Lewrie?” Sir William smiled.

“Aye, sir . . . a whole fleet of them. Seventeen sail of the line, with frigates, on our passage here. On the second of July.”

“Already at sea, aha!” Sir John exclaimed.

“Uhm, on their way back to Cartagena, Your Excellency. Their hoist said they had scurvy aboard, and were running short of rations. They’d been at sea a little less than two months.”

“Aha,” Sir William sighed, much less cheered by that news. In point of fact, quite deflated.

Lewrie shrugged his comment; what could one expect of Dons? A damn’ fine-looking fleet of ships, but the men . . . ! The officers, and such. Scurvy? After less than two months at sea? Puhl-lease!

“Yet Admiral Lord Hood is by now, surely, off Toulon and Marseilles,” Sir William continued. “To blockade the ports, bottle up the French Mediterranean fleet in Toulon . . . or bring it to battle, should they come out. He has succeeded in joining his scattered squadrons and uniting them as one. Twenty-two sail of the line. And, Sir John, we both know, as does Leftenant Lewrie, that when the Royal Navy gets to sea, there they stay. I am most confident the Spanish fleet will, after replenishing stores at Cartagena, be able to join him off Cape Cicie, creating an irresistible force. Or carry ashore, as . . . hmm.”

“Une flotte respectable, Sir William, mon cher . . .” the prime minister blathered on for a moment, “as we tentatively agreed.”

Oops, ah shit, Lewrie cringed; time for me to scamper. They want to talk something secret, and I shouldn’t be privy to it. Aye, look at the scowl on Hamilton’s phiz.

“Your Excellencies, I think I’d best take my leave now. Our ship will of course remain at Naples until you may have dispatches for us to carry to Lord Hood, Sir William. May one of your aides introduce me to your embassy’s shore agent? I would like to arrange for wood and water, and for our purser to replenish stores.”

“Leave for your crew here in Naples, as well, Leftenant?”

“Well, uhm . . .”

There came a knock on the door, and the flunky reappeared, most hideously humble, bowing and scraping. “Excuse me, Your Excellencies, but this note just came for the naval person? Quite urgent, I think.”

The naval person, indeed, Lewrie fumed as he opened the note!

“Christ,” he whispered, wiping his brow. Mr. Pruden had looked in on Captain Braxton, and his prognosis was grim. The captain needed a physician, instanter, else . . .

“Trouble aboard your ship, sir?” Sir William asked.

“The captain, Sir William,” Lewrie had to confess. Damnit all, he would be the very last to miss Braxton, should he pass over . . . do a little hornpipe of grief, perhaps? . . . but he couldn’t ignore this. That’d be as much as if he’d murdered the man, by neglect!

“He is ill, Sir William. Our surgeon urgently requests a physician, someone experienced with malaria. An old fever, come back—”

“Aha, so that is why you present yourself in his stead!” Acton exclaimed with sudden understanding, clapping his hands, foreign-like. “You wished to save his honour, not knowing how sick he was. Hoping he is better on the morrow, hein? You must be très. . . very loyal to him, I am thinking. How admirable. Does he not appear so, Sir William? And to inspire such loyalty . . . what a remarkable man his captain must be!”

Bloody Hell, are you dense as marble, Lewrie gawped to himself.

“Such loyalty toward one’s superior is a given, which goes in our Royal Navy without notice, Sir John,” Ambassador Hamilton boasted gruffly, though with a soft twinkle in his eyes. “I do allow, though, that such a touching and fiercely protective loyalty as the leftenant manifests toward his captain may only be construed as the merest indication of Leftenant Lewrie’s true qualities. Which I find, sir, are as commendable and admirable as ever I did see in an English gentleman.”

“But, I merely . . .”

Shut UP, fool, he warned himself! Aye, give a dog a good name! They want to think well o’ me, then who am I to complain?

“I merely . . . you are too kind, Sir William,” he said instead, all but scuffing a toe in modesty, as he strove to evince a seemly and humble blush. The irony of the situation, and that too-tight neckstock, helped, as he ducked his head like a stableboy.

“I insist, Sir William, that you allow me to suggest the offices of Signer Dottore Spadolini to see to your captain,” Acton offered.

“Your court physician?” Sir William posed dubiously. “Surely, with Her Majesty so near her time, ahem . . . still racked with grief over the death of her dear sister . . . perhaps it might be better were my own physician, Dottore Granuzzo, to attend him. Else, we might lose an heir to the throne. We could have him moved here, to Palazzo Sessa.”

“Perhaps it might be best, Sir William, to have your physician come out to the ship first,” Lewrie countered, fighting a smile over the thought of Braxton being physically removed from his ship, of coming to his senses ashore, and wondering if Cockerel had mutinied once more, and sailed off and left him! “He may be too ill, for a time, to be moved.”

“I will see to it, at once, Leftenant,” Sir William announced, picking up a tiny china bell to ring for a servant. “In either case, your ship will remain in port, anent your captain’s health . . . and how certain pending matters of state . . . uhm, develop. And what dispatches I may have, regarding those selfsame developments, for Lord Hood.”

“I, and Cockerel, are at your disposal, Sir William,” Alan said.

“And for your generosity of spirit, Lieutenant Lewrie,” Sir John rejoined, “Naples is yours to command. What service may our kingdom do the Royal Navy? There was talk of shore leave, before we were interrupted.”

“Well, milord, there’s firewood and water, the usual plaint,” Alan replied with a small grin. “Our purser, Mr. Husie, would always wish to go ashore, to replenish stores, purchase livestock for fresh meat and such. I had hoped, once we’d provisioned, to allow our crew out of discipline for a day or two. Not shore leave, though . . .”

“Send your purser to our shipyard, sir,” Sir John offered with a grand, expansive spread of his arms. “Your ship purchases nothing. We will gladly offer you the bounty of Naples. Fresh meat and bread, vino. . .”

“God bless you, Your Excellency, I am overcome by your generosity,” Lewrie declared happily. Sure, too, that Mr. Husie would also be turning St. Catherine’s wheels over free victuals.

“And for yourself, sir?” Sir John went on, tapping himself on the side of his nose cagily. “I know what sailors most desire, having once served in deprivation, aha . . . you see?”

“To sample the cuisine of Naples, Your Excellency. To try some new dishes. Eat my way back aboard ship, I should think,” Lewrie said, beaming now, happy as a pig in the corn-crib. “I’ve simple needs.”

“Then you shall do so, as our honoured visitor,” Acton promised, with another, cagier look. “Perhaps you should sample some fried fish, hein , Sir William?”

“Ah. Perhaps that may . . . uhm, advance matters,” the ambassador agreed, almost tipping the prime minister a conspiratorial wink. “Yes, I daresay it might. After a certain period of, uhm . . . briefing?”

A briefing on how to eat fried fish? Right! And both of ’em as cozy as a pair of housebreakers, Lewrie wondered. At least it sounds like there’s a free meal in it. But, dear as he wished it, that very instant . . .

“Your Excellencies will excuse me, I trust, but I must return to our ship. There are matters to arrange, and duties in my captain’s stead which I must see to, first.”

“You have a competent wardroom, sir?” Acton inquired.

“Aye, sir.”

Well, damn his eyes, Lieutenant Braxton was good at his job. Can’t be faulted professionally. Just personally. Scott to keep an eye on him, and Dimmock, Bosun Fairclough . . .

“An hour or so? I quite understand, Lieutenant Lewrie,” Acton nodded, and gave him a shrug of nautical cameraderie. “We both know, and appreciate, how so akin are the demands of a beautiful ship, such as your frigate, and the demands of a beautiful woman, n’est-ce pas? ”

“Quite, Your Excellency,” Lewrie smiled in return.

“Uhm,” Sir William frowned, peering at a distant clock of impressive dimensions and baroque gilding. “It is now half-past nine or so. Do you return to Palazzo Sessa by . . . half-past eleven? Will that be time enough, sir? Good. You are turned out reasonably well. Your current uniform and toilette will suffice. I do not believe there is need for anything more formal, not today at any rate. From here, we may all coach together. Do you concur, Your Excellency?”

“Absolutely, Sir William,” Acton agreed.

“My physician will be along presently. You may coach together to the quays,” Hamilton decided, getting to his feet, creaking in the effort; for all his urbane grace and patrician leanness, he was an old man. He put his hands in the small of his back and leaned backward.

“Aye, Sir William, and thankee again. I cannot express how much I am indebted to you. One thing before I go, however. Uhm . . . exactly where will we be coaching to? ”

“Why, to introduce you to Neapolitan cuisine, Lieutenant,” Sir John Acton smirked, sharing another of those maddening conspiratorial grins with the ambassador. “You may try some fried fish. And be presented to His Majesty, King Ferdinand the Fourth. The King of Naples.”